Abstract

Davidson has always been explicit in his faithful adherence to the main doctrines of Quine’sphilosophy of language, among which the indeterminacy of translation thesis is significant.For Quine, the indeterminacy of translation has considerable ontological consequences,construed as leading to a sceptical conclusion regarding the existence of fine-grained meaningfacts. Davidson’s suggested reading of Quine’s indeterminacy arguments seems to be intendedto block any such sceptical consequences. According to this reading, Quine’s arguments at mostyield the conclusion that there are always different ways of representing the facts about meaning,rather than the sceptical conclusion that there are no such facts. It is, however, puzzling howDavidson can endorse the main premises of Quine’s arguments, i.e. his general physicalistic viewand his thesis of the indeterminacy of translation, and yet resist the arguments’ sceptical outcome.I will argue that Davidson’s construal of Quine’s thesis of the indeterminacy of translationis unjustified and faces a problematic dilemma.